Being a bus driver is much like being the captain of a ship. You are ultimately responsible for the safety of the ship and those on it. It begins each morning before the initial bus run. Even in the pitch black of a December morning I have to do a bus safety inspection. This involves checking the oil and coolant levels, checking the tire inflation, making sure the air brake will pop when the air level gets low, checking all of the many required light systems and more. Does the emergency door open? Do the emergency window alarms work? The purpose is to make sure my bus can safely and dependably carry the children to and from school. If something goes wrong, it’s all on me, the captain.

Being the captain also means I have to solve problems that may occur in the course of my daily runs. This can be something simple like helping tie a shoe. 

I’m sitting in the driver’s seat when the tiny second grader asks me for help. I pat my leg and she places her foot on my thigh so I can tie her laces in a double knot.

 That’s an easy one. 

Early this year I was subbing an elementary route in a raging blizzard. Even after clearing the windshield, and with the windshield wipers going full bore, I only had a small clear space to see through. I couldn’t remember where the first turn was. I asked the kids for help, but it was such a whiteout that they could be sure either. It was only after I made a best-guess turn that they informed me, “This is the wrong street.” That wouldn’t have been so bad except that the street turned out to be a dead end. While staring at the ditch at the end of the narrow road with forty vociferous kids behind me I had to decide what to do. It was simple. I had to find a way to turn the bus around without backing into any cars or knocking down mailboxes. The solution was simple, but in a snowed-in forty-foot beast it wasn’t easy.

Some situations are trickier. 

I’m at the end of my bus run far out in the country of a town that is ten miles south of the city where the school is. Who should be my last two riders are walking to the front of the bus to get off at their country lane. I notice a kindergarten age boy walking up the aisle with them. I am alarmed.

 “Who is that?” I ask.

The teenage girl and her brother shrug and get off. This is my problem, not theirs.

I alter my question. “Who are you?”

The little boy whispers something.

“What?”

“Jimmy Spinder,” he says, a little louder. 

The school year is only a week old and I’m still not sure who’s supposed to be on my bus and who isn’t. Did this boy just not get off at the correct stop earlier or is he supposed to be on one of the other two buses that bring kids to this small town? 

“Do you know which bus you usually ride?”

The boy shrugs. “I think it’s this one.”

“I haven’t seen you before. Have you seen me?”

The boy shrugs.

“Do you know where you are supposed to get off?”

“Yes,” he says proudly. “I get off at the dairy.”

Ah, that’s the other bus that comes to this small town. In fact, the dairy is only three miles away. I get on the radio and call the other bus driver. “Bus 17,” I say, “I have your Jimmy Spinder on my bus.”

 I’m thinking I’ll just run him out to the dairy and drop him off when Bus 17 says, “I don’t have a Jimmy Spinder on my bus.”

I sit for a confused moment trying to figure this out. The answer comes from another bus driver who has been listening in. “Which dairy?” she asks.

I look at the boy and say, “Do you live in Levan or Nephi?”

“Nephi,” he says.

I roll my eyes. This boy really got on the wrong bus. He’s about twenty-five miles from the other dairy where he is supposed to be. What to do? I have another job starting in fifteen minutes. I can’t take him all the way to the other dairy. That will take an hour. Fortunately Bus 17 is going back into Nephi. We arrange a meeting place and transfer the boy. He gets home safely to his very worried mother who has already been calling the school to find out where he is.

Some situations are just strange

On another morning I am cruising slowly up the street to pick up my last stop of kids. I can see all fifteen of them lined up nice and neat watching as I approach. Suddenly, a big yellow cat wanders out in the road in front of me. I press the brake and my bus squeaks to a stop. I think the cat is going to keep crossing until it is out of my way. Instead, it stops right in front of me and sneezes violently three times. 

“Poor cat has allergies,” I say to anyone sitting up front who might be listening.

With the sneezes done, I think he will continue crossing the road. He doesn’t. Instead, he raises his nose high in the air and tilts his head this way and that. This is one strange cat. Suddenly he sneezes again. In the yellow rays of the morning sun filtering through the tree limbs I see cat spit shoot up into the air like a fountain. I shake my head in empathy, but begin to turn the wheel to see if I can get the bus around this poor cat without squishing it under my duals. My kids are going to be late for school. Suddenly a fourth-grade girl leaps out of the line and runs out into the road. There’s a cat in danger and a bus that needs saving. She is just the one for the job. She scoops the large cat up in her arms and moves him to the side of the road. She then runs back to take her place in line. 

What a little superhero. She solved the problem before the captain figured out a solution. It’s good to have people with initiative on the crew.

Sometimes ordinary confusion and extraordinary confusion are hard to tell apart. 

I’m riding on another driver’s morning run to learn his route. I’m chatting with the driver while the kids laugh, chat, and tease behind us. I hear a girl calling out louder than the other kids. I wonder if she had had too many bowls of Sugar Bombs cereal for breakfast. After a few more blocks I hear the little girl again. 

“What’s going on?” she yells. 

I wonder what it is she’s playing. We’re stopping to pick up his last four children when I again hear, “What’s going on?” I ignore the overly energetic girl but notice the smell of hot coolant in the bus. I know the smell of bus coolant well, but usually don’t smell it in the bus. As the driver brakes to a stop, I tell him I am going to go back and see where the smell is coming from.

I quickly identify the girl who has been yelling because as I walk back, she meets my eyes and yells one more time, “What’s going on?” I can see confusion and fear on her face. As the bus brakes to a stop my shoes are suddenly awash in steaming, green coolant as it runs up the aisle to the front of the bus. The coolant runs through the heaters that are under some of the seats and fans blow the warm air. Apparently, the hose to the heater under her seat has broken and coolant is pouring into the bus. It’s no wonder this poor girl is wondering “What’s going on?”

The bus driver is a good captain. He stops the bus with a splash as the coolant hits the dash at the front. He radios and reports the problem to the transportation supervisor. He opens the front door and has the kids outside move back so they won’t be caught up in the flow of coolant which flows in a small waterfall down the bus steps. Then both of us help the kids off the bus. The driver counts to make sure we have them all. About this time another bus pulls up and we escort the kids onto it so they can finish their ride to school. It all goes pretty smoothly considering.

Bus driving has a weight of responsibilities, but it is usually pretty straightforward—pick the kids up and drop them off. It can be boringly routine. The universe takes care of “boring” with the “What’s going on?” situations. It may be anything from a foot in your lap with a shoe needing tied or steaming, green coolant splashing down your aisle. It could be a sneezing cat holding your bus hostage or a little, misplaced kindergartener and neither you nor he knows where he lives. “What’s going on?” is a question a bus driver needs to get used to. Finding the answer and a solution makes the job more satisfying than many would believe it could be. It’s all part of the bus driving adventure. 

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These books by Tory Anderson are now available on Amazon in Kindle and paperback format: